WE felt sad as we watched “Labyu with an Accent” in a nearly empty theatre. Coco Martin is one of the biggest local stars we have today, but here he is squandering his popularity in insultingly moronic movies like this, so it’s not surprising viewers are avoiding it.

Mind you, he wrote the story, co-wrote the screenplay and also co-directed it. When he conceived of the story, he probably thought that the idea of a rich, educated and balikbayan career woman from the States falling in love with a poor macho dancer will be appealing to moviegoers.

It sounds implausible, but maybe it could have worked with a better scriptwriter and director to make it all believable. After all, there have been many other hard-to-believe romcoms before about love blooming between two very disparate individuals, but they’re better written and more expertly crafted.

Coco’s character, Gabo, is portrayed to be a good-hearted do-gooder who cares for his family and his neighbors. This is all very good and makes Gabo quite endearing and sympathetic.

But the problem is that Gabo is also very dumb, doing all the stupid things you will not expect from a sensible person with something bright between his ears. Many of his actions are aimed to make him endearing to the audience for them to laugh, but they actually make his character look so “bobo”!

As our daughter in law said after we all watched the movie: “The situations are all so unrealistic.” And it’s true, you just don’t have to suspend your disbelief. You have to leave your brain at home for you to find the movie likeable.

The way things and events are presented in the storytelling, it’s all so “pwersadong-pwersado” in its efforts to make the movie a crowd-pleaser.

Gabo has a family business called “Ultimate Jowa Experience” where he tries to please lonely women and gays to forget their heartbreaks since the movie stresses, after his sanitized macho dancing scene, that he is built like a horse.

It’s so hard to believe that a clear-thinking and intelligent career woman like Tricia (Jodi Sta. Maria) will fall in love with a male stripper/gigolo that easily, no matter how well hung he is.

Coco is so in love with Jodi that when she returns to California, he quickly follows her. As if it’s that easy to get a U.S. visa. And where the hell did he get his plane fare to fly to California when their family is poor?

When he gets to Jodi’s lavish home, she tells him that they have to do something first. He quickly disrobes thinking she wants to make out with him, when she’s just providing him with new clothes that will make him more presentable to her uppity parents, Michael de Mesa and Jaclyn Jose.

Jodi presents him as a successful businessman she met in Manila. Of course, he cannot even speak straight English, so Jodi does most of the talking for him. It’s supposed to be funny, but it’s so outdated as so many other actors have tried to make the audience laugh before with their carabao English. We’re really the one who feels embarrassed for Coco.

Later on, they drop the comedy and the movie switches to heavy drama. Jodi’s parents maltreat Coco and oppress him, humiliating him in front of other people and even reporting him as an illegal alien to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), so he should be arrested and deported.

We’re supposed to sympathize with Coco with all this, but we cannot. To begin with, he doesn’t even seem to think. He and Jodi rent a plush apartment when they have no regular income.

He won’t allow Jodi to find work since he is the man and so he believes that he should be the one to provide for her, but he hardly earns enough from being a busboy. In this day and age of woman empowerment, this is really very stupid.

At this point, we’re already so bored and we just want the movie to end sooner than soon. The movie’s plus factor is the many scenes shot on actual locations in Los Angeles and Hollywood.

They even employed the services of local actors who are now based in the U.S. to appear in supporting roles, like Donita Rose and G Toengi.

It’s just like Coco’s movie with Angelica Panganiban last year filmed in Dubai, “Love or Money”, that was not released in theaters but shown via streaming due to the pandemic. It’s a glossy production but the melodramatic twists and turns in the plotting made it such a boring piece of mediocrity.

Coco is such a good actor he deserves to be handled by better directors who will bring out the best in him. The problem is he did ‘Ang Probinsyano’, that ran for seven years and undoubtedly one of the biggest hits in local teleseryes.

So now, he probably feels he can do no wrong in writing and directing his own works and can get away with anything he wants to do in the eyes of the viewers. Coco remains very charming on screen, but as of now, he already knows that charm alone is not enough to attract moviegoers to watch “Labyu With An Accent”.